National Briefing | South: Florida: Cuban Boy Calls Castro Friend

Published: September 30, 2005

Eli?Gonz?z, the Cuban boy at the center of an international custody battle five years ago, calls President Fidel Castro of Cuba his friend but also says he hopes someday to see his Miami family again. ''Despite everything they did, it was wrong, they are my family,'' the boy said in an interview with the CBS program ''60 Minutes,'' which will be broadcast Sunday. Eli? now 11, set off a battle after he was rescued off the Florida coast in 1999 after his mother died at sea in a failed effort to reach the United States. His Miami relatives fought to prevent his return to Cuba, but he was reunited with his father in Cuba after an armed federal raid on his relatives' home in 2000.